


it's a dark road (when you walk it alone)

by dustofwarfare



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, M/M, World of Ruin, implied Noctis/Prompto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-03
Updated: 2018-06-03
Packaged: 2019-05-17 22:41:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14840553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustofwarfare/pseuds/dustofwarfare
Summary: “This –” she touches her fingers lightly to the burnished silver of Aranea’s lance. “This is what keeps us safe.” She reaches out and touches her fingers to Aranea’s armor, the spot above her heart. “This is what keeps us going.”It’s a pretty sentiment. Aranea wishes she could believe it. Maybe she does believe it. Maybe that’s why she’s so scared._____Aranea and Iris find common ground as daemon slayers in the World of Ruin, and Aranea learns maybe it's okay to have someone to want to survive for.





	it's a dark road (when you walk it alone)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to @marmolita for the beta, as always! 
> 
> (Set during the World of Ruin, Iris is 20 by the time anything sexual happens with Aranea, just FYI).

Aranea doesn’t remember where she was for the last sunset.

The days grew progressively shorter, and the daemons bolder, and Niflheim fell to pieces around her. If she saw the last sunset, she was probably fighting something.

Maybe she slept through it. Who knows.

***

She waits in line two hours for a kebab.

Aranea tells herself not to complain. The fact there’s even food left to  _ sell  _ is a miracle in and of itself. It’s been almost a year since the sun set for good, and Lestallum is overrun with people seeking the shelter and relative safety of the city’s lights.

She’s been scavenging for so long that the idea of food she doesn’t have to cook herself is worth waiting for. Even if the kebabs, when she finally hands over some gil for them, are more skewer than meat. The harried-looking vendor gives her a tired smile.

Aranea just shrugs and moves out of the line. It stretches back behind her for what seems like miles. She wonders if it’s going to incite a revolt when the vendor runs out of meat. There are fewer vendors around than the last time she was here, though she can’t really remember when that was. Six months ago? It’s hard to tell time without the sun. Who knew.

She takes her food and glances around for somewhere to sit. The market has always been crowded, even back when this was just a city instead of humanity’s last bastion or whatever the hell it is now. She scans the available tables, and there’s one in the back with a single person sitting there and one empty chair.

Normally she’d just eat standing up, but she waited  _ two hours _ for this meal and she’s determined to enjoy it. So she marches over to the table and says, “This seat taken?”

The girl looks up at her. She looks vaguely familiar, dark hair pulled back in two low pigtails, eyes dark and vaguely mistrustful and set in a pale face. A year ago, Aranea would have thought her too young to be by herself. But times have changed, and a lot of people are too young to be doing anything. Survival changes everything.  

“Go for it.” The girl shrugs.

“Thanks.” Aranea collapses gratefully into one of the chairs. Her kebabs are cold, but she doesn’t care. They taste like a five-thousand gil meal to her.

She’s just polishing off the last one when she notices the girl’s boots. Aranea frowns. She’s seen those before. Either this girl found a genuine pair of Crownsguard footwear, or she’s one of them. And she doesn’t look nearly old enough, but Aranea was fighting from the time she was eight so she really can’t be sure. “You a Lucian?”

“Yeah.” The girl gives her an odd look. “You’re not.”

Aranea shrugs. “Doesn’t much matter anymore, does it? We’re all fucked.”

“You’re wrong.” The girl’s chin tilts. “It still matters. Some of us haven’t forgotten.” Her voice is scathing. She pushes away from the table. “Imperial  _ scum _ .”

Aranea snorts, kicks her boots out and rests them on the girl’s abandoned seat. “Sure. Good luck surviving with that chip on your shoulder, kid.”

“I’m not a kid.” The girl raises her chin, and suddenly there’s a sword leveled at Aranea’s throat. “I’m a  _ fucking  _ Amicitia.”

Ah. That’s why she looks familiar. Aranea laughs. “Tell your hot brother I said hi, next time you see him. Name’s Aranea Highwind. He’ll remember me.”

The girl blinks. She drops the sword. “He mentioned you,” she says, slowly. “You helped them out a few times.”

“A few times,” Aranea agrees.

The girl nods. “I’m Iris.”

Right. She’d thought it was something like that, some kind of flower. “Charmed.” She throws a two-finger salute. “Thanks for the table.”

Iris looks like she’s going to say something, but in the end, all she does is walk away.

Aranea wonders if she’ll ever see the girl again. Probably not. Things are only going to get worse, and she doesn’t plan on staying in Lestallum. Maybe that  _ imperial scum  _ comment hit a little too close to home. Maybe not. She’s too tired to really figure it out, but she knows that her talents are far more useful out there, in the dark, than here in this crowded city.

She’s learned the hard way that sometimes daemons are better company than people.

***

She sees the fight from the safety of the haven. There’s someone battling a horde of daemons – flans, it looks like – and they’re not half-bad. But with every daemon felled, more appear. Whoever it is fighting, they’re doing so alone.

Aranea watches for a few more seconds, then sighs. She stands up, grabs her lance and vaults over the edge of the haven.

The numbers aren’t favoring humanity. They need everyone out there who can fight, and whoever this is – though they’re outnumbered – can certainly do that.

Aranea leaps into battle, her lance flashing as she takes out the flans. It’s sort of satisfying – or it would be, if she hadn’t done this about a million times before finding the haven. The other hunter doesn’t say anything, but she can tell that whoever it is, they’re small and fast. And they’re fighting with daggers, which means they have to get in close.

“Let me get them first, then move in and finish them,” Aranea calls to her companion. She’s not a commander anymore but she knows the voice to use when she wants to be obeyed.

The hunter doesn’t argue, and they work together in grim silence to dispatch the flans. The last one vanishes into a seething, bubbling pile of daemon goo and Aranea turns to her fellow hunter. She barely draws breath to speak when another godsdamned purplish light springs up from the ground, resolving itself into a fucking  _ iron giant. _

“Hell, no,” Aranea says, then, “Follow me. There’s a haven over there –”

The hunter – who looks to be a girl – isn’t listening. She lets out a primal scream and launches herself at the iron giant, daggers flashing.

Aranea sighs and pulls out her lance. Again. _ I guess we’re doing this. _

It takes almost two hours to kill the iron giant. When it finally falls with a grumbling moan, shaking the earth beneath their feet, Aranea pushes her sweaty hair out of her face and glares over at the girl. “Well. So glad we wasted a few hours doing  _ that _ .”

“One less iron giant is one less,” the girl says. Her voice is familiar. “Thanks for the help.”

“Yeah. Don’t mention it. Also, next time someone says,  _ hey, I have a spot at a haven, follow me _ ….you should think about doing it.” Her eyes widen as the girl draws near. Not a girl so much, anymore, but Aranea recognizes her all the same.

Her hair is longer, and she’s lost the childish softness around her face –  _ who hasn’t? ­ _ – but the boots are the same. Aranea smiles. “Well, well. Iris Amicitia. We meet again.”

“Yeah.” Iris is breathing hard. “Aranea, right?”

“That’s right.” From the distance, she sees another bright flare of purple. “You want to take this one on, go for it. But you’re on your own.” She knows the temptation to keep fighting and fighting until there’s nothing left to kill. But she also knows how pointless it is, because the daemons don’t ever stop. “Or, you can follow me to the haven. I’ll even share my food.”

Iris stares at her for a moment. In the distance, the purplish lights reveal themselves to be mindflayers. Iris takes one look at them, then nods. “Lead the way.”

***

They make it to the haven without incident. Iris collapses the second they’re within the safe embrace of the runes, leaning back on her hands. “Thanks. For coming in to help. Especially considering I called you names, last time we met.”

Aranea grins. “Don’t worry about. Believe me. I’m not even gonna argue.” She has a lot of opinions about the Empire and they’re all bad.

“I told my brother what you said. He told me I could trust you.” Iris takes the cup of water Aranea hands her and drinks it gratefully. “Gods, this is good. Thank you.”

She’s sweet, Iris. And a total badass. “You’re good. I still think you were nuts to take on that iron giant, but damn, girl. You can certainly hold your own.”

“I probably wouldn’t have done it, if you hadn’t been there.” Iris smiles. It’s a sudden bright grin, the sort Aranea hasn’t seen in a very, very long time. “So thanks for playing along.”

“Should have let you get pounded into dust,” Aranea mutters. But she doesn’t mean it. “How’s your brother and the rest of Prince Charming’s retinue?”

Iris’s smile dims a bit. “They’re…I don’t know. Everyone’s split up. Too many daemons, and too many people to try and protect, for anyone to stay together.”

That’s the truth. She thinks about Biggs and Wedge, and hopes wherever they are, they’re okay. It’s probably wishful thinking, and it’s not like she has any way of knowing for sure. She thinks they stayed behind in Niflheim, though the gods only know why.  

“You still think he’s gonna come back?” Aranea asks. There’s no need to say who  _ he  _ is.

Iris gives her a stubborn look. “What’s the point of doing any of this, if we don’t?”

_ There isn’t one,  _ Aranea thinks, but doesn’t say it.

***

She hears about Iris several times over the next year, but never sees her.

_ Iris the Daemon Slayer,  _ they call her, in reverent tones. She’s amassed quite a kill count. They still keep track of it, like a game, in these early years.

Aranea wonders if Iris still believes the king will come back. If she’s fighting for the dawn, or just to survive. 

She wonders if there’s even a difference.

***

So this is it. Aranea Highwind’s last stand.

Aranea is on her back on the ground, fingers tight around her lance, staring up at the mindflayer that is probably going to kill her.

“Couldn’t you be, like, something else?” Aranea pants, pain shuddering through her. “A tonberry? At least they’re cute. You’re an ugly motherfucker.”  

She readies the lance and drags air into her lungs. She thinks she has a sprained ankle and a broken rib, but maybe she can take this fucking piece of shit to hell with her. It has sharp claws. It’ll go for her throat and she’ll get the tip of the lance in its jugular. She hopes it has one. Daemon anatomy is not her forte.

Still. “Let’s do this, asshole.” Fear is unwelcome but inevitable. She’s known all along she’d go out like this, but that doesn’t make it any easier to come to terms with.

The mindflayer shrieks – she wonders for a minute if it’s telling  _ her  _ the same thing in its daemon-language – but then it collapses without tearing her throat out. Blinking, she can see a small form standing just behind it.

Aranea’s grin is fierce and bloody. “Good timing.”

Iris the Daemon Slayer sheathes her daggers and approaches as the mindflayer dissolves into nothing. “C’mon,” she says, reaching down to help her up. “I’ve got some curatives and there’s a haven right over there.”

Aranea can’t quite muffle the sound of pain as she gets to her feet. She sways, her ankle throbbing as she struggles to find her footing. Iris tries to help her, but Aranea waves her off. “Sure you don’t want to throw down with an iron giant first?”

Iris’s grin is as sharp as her daggers. “I’m sure. Let’s go.”

When they get to the haven, Iris rummages through her gear and hands her something in a glass bottle. Aranea’s eyes go wide. She hasn’t seen a potion in years. “Are you sure you want to waste this on me?”

“I’m sure. The world needs you out there.” Iris settles down, sitting cross-legged on the ground. “Go on. Please.”

Aranea drinks the potion. Luckily her ankle really was just sprained because the pain vanishes almost immediately. The cracked rib is a little harder to heal, but at least she can take a deep breath without blinding agony anymore. “Gods. I forgot how great these are.”

“Right?” Iris waves it away when Aranea tries to share the rest of the potion. “I’m okay. You finish it.”

She’s not about to argue.

“Was going to head to Lestallum,” Iris says. “Get a room. A bed. A shower. We could go together, if you want.”

Aranea shouldn’t. She knows her place is out here, and she knows that this time she got a lucky break but it won’t always be that way. Still. The idea sounds nice enough that she nods. “Sure.”

Iris yawns. “Could use some rest, first. A few hours, then we can go?”

Aranea is pretty sure that Iris would be fine heading out now, and that this is just for her benefit. But she says, “Sounds good,” and doesn’t fight the urge to settle back on her pack and take a nap.

In the distance, things unnatural and unholy are howling.   

***

Lestallum is so crowded that it’s almost impossible to walk. It makes Aranea want to reconsider the whole idea and go back out into the wilderness. Daemons seem preferable to the press of humanity, desperate for food and shelter and something to make surviving worthwhile.

She follows Iris through the crowds, almost losing her twice. There aren’t any food vendors, and all the markets and cafes have been turned into makeshift tent cities. She wonders where they’re going, because the idea of finding a place to stay in this madhouse seems as impossible as the sunrise.

They don’t go to the Leville or any of the other hotels that used to exist. Iris takes them to a house tucked in a back alley, explaining that a lot of people rent out rooms for extra supplies. Gil is starting to become mostly useless in a society that is desperate for food.

Aranea adds some of her own supplies to help pay for the room, which isn’t much more than some protein bars and an LED light. But it’s worth it.

“Wish I didn’t have to ask you ladies for anything,” the man says, pulling the supplies toward him. “Know what you’re out there doin’ for us.”

“Hey. We’re all just trying to survive, here,” Aranea says, and the man gives her a grateful look before showing her and Iris to the room.

It’s nice enough, with a double bed and bath. Aranea wonders if this is the house’s main bedroom, if the guy is sleeping on the couch so they can have it for a few hours. She doesn’t much care, though. The thought of sleeping in a bed, and being  _ clean _ , is too great a temptation.

“You go first. I’ll see if I can head out and find some food.” Iris leaves before Aranea can argue. She wishes she had half the girl’s energy.

Aranea goes into the bathroom and strips awkwardly out of her armor. Her reflection is so awful she can barely stand to look at it – hair a mess of tangles and leaves and dirt, face smudged, eyes shadowed and exhausted. She’s probably tracked mud in with her boots, but oh well.

The hot water feels so good that she moans in pleasure as it washes over her. There’s only a bar of soap but she doesn’t care, uses it to wash her body and her face and her hair. It takes a lot before the water runs clean, and she realizes she doesn’t have much to wear that isn’t soiled. The idea of putting something dirty on over her clean body is awful, but she doesn’t have much choice.

She washes a few things with the same bar of soap in the sink, wrapped in a towel. Maybe they’ll dry before too long and she can wear them to bed.

Iris comes back while she’s rinsing the tank top and underwear out in the shower, hitting the fabric against the porcelain to try and get the water out.

“Oh, hey. I have some clean stuff you can borrow, if you want.”

Aranea looks up and shrugs. “This’ll be fine, when it dries. You don’t like my high fashion towel gown?” She stands up, throws one hand on her hip and strikes a pose. “I thought it looked pretty good. I hear it’s all the rage nowadays.”

Iris blushes. “It – yeah. Looks great! But I mean. Those won’t be dry until the morning, probably. Just borrow something, okay?”

She should probably protest all of this caretaking. It’s a dangerous thing to get used to. But Aranea knows stubbornness like she knows the weight of a lance in her hand, and she can see from Iris’s face that arguing isn’t going to work so she doesn’t try, just sighs and holds out her hands.

Iris is smaller than her in just about every way, so everything is a little too tight and clingy – the tank top Iris gives her is more like a crop top on Aranea – but it’s clean, so. She sits on the bed and combs through her hair while Iris disappears into the bathroom to take her own shower.

When she comes out, she’s dressed almost identically in a pair of brief boy-short underwear and a thin tank top. Hers fit, though. Aranea looks like one of those models that used to drape themselves over cars, back in the day. Cid has a few of those calendars in Hammerhead.

“I look like I’m going to pose for this month’s  _ Daemon Slayer Babes  _ pin-up calendar,” Aranea says. “Hi, I’m Miss June.”

Iris giggles, the sound girlish. She blushes, but says, “You’d be a hard act to follow for Miss July, that’s for sure.” There’s an appreciative look in her eyes that makes Aranea think Iris isn’t as young as she thought.

Iris climbs on the bed and upends a tote full of food – mostly protein bars, some bottled water, and a few bags of probably stale chips. But they eat it all like it’s a feast fit for a queen. Being clean, with a moderately full stomach and a soft bed, feels so good it’s almost sinful.

“Never thought a bar of soap and some stale chips would make me this happy,” Aranea says, shaking her head.

“Right?” Iris laughs, sounding wistful. “The other night I was thinking about all the food I wasted over the years. All the apples in my lunch that I didn’t want to eat and threw away. Ugh. I threw away  _ apples _ .”

“Off with your head,” Aranea deadpans.

Iris grins. Her body is all hard angles and muscles, and there are a few old scratches and cuts marking her arms and a nasty one on her calf, perilously close to her tendon. “It’s kinda funny, isn’t it? A former Niflheim army commodore and a member of House Amicitia of Lucis sharing snacks in some dude’s bed in Lestallum.”

Aranea steals one of Iris’s chips. “You called me imperial scum the first time we met.”

Iris winces. “Yeah. Sorry about that. It’s hard to remember that we’re supposed to hate each other.”

“That’s the funny thing about fighting things that want to eat you,” Aranea says. “It’s such a black-and-white situation of  _ kill or be killed  _ that you forget how nuanced politics actually are.”

“That’s the truth,” Iris says, and goes back to her chips.

They climb into bed when they’re done eating, and Aranea settles down with a thin sheet draped over her and Iris warm at her side. The lights that keep the daemons at bay shine through the window, and Aranea closes her eyes and falls asleep, dreaming of the sun.

***

She wakes up a few hours later, and Iris is pressed up against her, an arm and a leg thrown over Aranea like she’s a body pillow.

Aranea almost moves her, but it’s…nice, to have someone there. She used to be a loner, back before the world went to hell. Now that she doesn’t have a choice in the matter, it’s funny how different it feels.

It could also be that Iris is smoking hot and smells good, her strong body all supple and warm against Aranea’s own. Hey, she’s only human. And humans do need other humans, even in this world of ruin. Even if it’s only for a night.

Somehow she knows that Iris is awake. Aranea reaches out and draws her fingers through Iris’s dark hair, clean and silky from her shower. Iris presses closer, stroking a hand gently, questioningly, over Aranea’s back. “You even old enough to do this?”

“Of course,” Iris murmurs. “I’m almost twenty-one.”

_ Shiva.  _ Twenty-one? Aranea barely remembers her early twenties. She’d been a mercenary, a few years away from signing a contract with Niflheim. The Empire had been a lot different, back then. Before Iedolas’s obsession with the Lucian Crystal, before he listened to the whispered words of the chancellor who ended up damning the world.

_ I should have killed that smarmy bastard when I had the chance. _

But it’s not time to think about that, not with Iris tugging her close and kissing her. It’s shy at first, almost hesitant, and Aranea hopes that this isn’t Iris’s first time. That seems like too much pressure, like it would be about something more than just two weary soldiers taking comfort from each other when they have a bed to do it in.

“Hey,” Aranea says, moving back a little from the kiss. “You’ve done this before, right?”

“Yup. Not a lot, but I have a little experience. Not with someone as hot as you, though.” Iris gives her a sly smile. “Have you? Don’t worry. I’ll be gentle.”

“Saucy, are we?” Aranea flips them so that Iris is on her back. That’s all the encouragement she needs. Backtalk always does it for her. Also, being called hot doesn’t hurt.

Iris hums, stretching out and helping Aranea push her tank top up and off her head.

It’s not Aranea’s first time by far, but it  _ has  _ been awhile. Physical encounters are few and far between, especially for hunters. Maybe at first it was easy to get all riled up and go looking for someone to burn off the adrenaline of a fight with, but as the night lingered and the daemons multiplied, fighting was no longer quite the rush it once was.

Afterward, most people – including Aranea – just wanted some food and a few hours rest, before going out to do it all over again.

But this is good – no reason to hurry or rush, and Iris is beautifully responsive beneath her. Aranea tugs off the little boyshorts she’s wearing and tosses Iris’s legs over her shoulders. Iris makes a pleased noise and arches, her fingers coming down to slide through Aranea’s hair. She has calloused hands and short nails, and they feel good on Aranea’s scalp.

She’s not shy about it, either – knows how to move Aranea’s head to get her mouth where she wants it.

“Oh, that’s good – right there, yeah,” Iris murmurs, when Aranea’s tongue finds the right spot. “Gods, you’re so good a this.”

That’s – well. Flattering. Aranea brings her off fast – which is  _ also  _ flattering, godsdamn -- and then again, and a third time with her mouth  _ and _ her fingers. She’s impressed at Iris’s stamina, but she shouldn’t be. “Figures a girl who goes after an iron giant after killing a horde of flans has multiple orgasms.”

“It does? How?” Iris grins down at her, lazy and satisfied, then tugs her hair. “C’mere.”

Aranea moves up her body to kiss her, sharing her taste before Iris suddenly shifts and pushes Aranea on her back and gets to work stripping her.

No lie, getting out of that too-tight tank-top-turned-crop-top is great. Even more so when Iris has her hands all over, learning the curves of Aranea’s body with a touch that might not be  _ expert  _ but is definitely experienced. And so, so eager.

It takes Aranea longer to come, but Iris doesn’t seem to mind and Aranea certainly doesn’t. It’s hard to remember that her body is capable of feeling pleasure as well as pain. Iris is a tease about it, her mouth slick and wet, fingers sliding gently inside as she licks and sucks. The slow build up means it’s an intense orgasm when Aranea finally comes, causing her calves to cramp from tension as her feet point, her thighs trembling in the aftermath. She pushes gently at Iris’s head when it’s clear Iris has no intention of stopping, because the overstimulation is veering on uncomfortable. “Yeah, hey, Iris, we all don’t come like a house on fire three times in a row. Gimme a minute, ‘kay?”

Iris lifts her head and grins up at her. “Figures a girl who doesn’t want to fight an iron giant after a horde of flans needs some recovery time.” Her mouth is wet, her eyes sparkling. “Take your time. I can take care of myself until you’re ready to go again.”

“Iris the Daemon Slayer…or is it really Iris the Daemon Slayer Layer?”

Iris groans and laughs at the same time. “That was awful, Aranea.  _ Awful _ .” But she’s giggling, and making her laugh is almost as nice as making her come.

Almost.

“Well, then get to it. Inspire me,” Aranea says, lazily, watching as Iris moves and stretches out next to her, naked and eager, her hand already between her legs. “If you can get off four times before I’m ready to go again, I’ll give you this chocolate bar I’ve been saving in my bag for two months. I think it melted a few times but hey. It’s chocolate.”

“Mmm.” Iris bites her lip, then says, “You’re on.”

***

Iris wins the chocolate bar.

***

“So. Where are you headed?” Iris asks, as they stand on the old overlook in front of Lestallum. There’s nothing to see anymore but endless black and the occasional spark of daemons manifesting out on the plains.

“Thought I’d head down to Hammerhead.” There are better supplies for hunters there than in Lestallum.  “Might see if Cid can do anything about sharpening my lance. How about you?”

Iris shrugs. “Probably head up the main road. I used to do that all the time, helping people get to Lestallum from wherever they were being chased out of. But there haven’t been a lot of people coming in, not in the last few months. I don’t know if that means they all got here already, or….”

“Yeah.” Aranea glances down at her. As much as she enjoyed the sex and the night of intimacy with another person, she knows this is why it’s dangerous. Attachments just get in the way. But something about Iris’s fierce determination, that smile of hers that the night hasn’t taken and the spark of  _ life  _ in her eyes is addicting.

It reminds Aranea that maybe there might, one day, be more than this.

And that’s the part that’s dangerous. Of all the terrors they face in this new world, false hope hits harder than any daemon. “Hopefully we’ll run into each other again.”

“I’d like that.” Iris is scanning the darkness, all business. She glances up at her. “I wouldn’t mind a repeat, if we do. Or another chocolate bar. But not one with nuts.”

“Sorry, m’lady,” Aranea says dryly. “I’ll pick up a better one next time.”

“You better.” Iris says. She touches her fist to her heart and bows. “Take care, Aranea.”

“I can’t believe you just bowed to – what was it? Imperial scum?” It’s sort of a harsh thing to say in reply to Iris’s gesture, but Aranea wears harshness like armor and wields sarcasm like a lance. She did that even  _ before  _ the world was overrun with daemonspawn.

“I didn’t,” Iris says. “I bowed to Aranea Highwind. Badass Daemon Slayer. And badass Daemon Slayer Layer.” She winks.

“Go,” Aranea says, with a strangled laugh.  _ Go before I decide to come with you.  _ She gives Iris a salute, but this one isn’t the lazy, mocking one she’d thrown back in Lestallum when they’d run into each other years ago. This one is a proper salute. One soldier to another.

Iris nods. Aranea stays at the overlook, watching, until Iris disappears into the dark.

***

Over the next few months, she makes the trip from Hammerhead to Lestallum frequently. Clearing out the daemons is pretty much impossible, but they’ve started to organize more supply runs and if Aranea can make it a little safer, well, then. That’s something.

It’s probably six months after their night in Lestallum that she sees Iris again. It’s at a haven, and this one has about six or seven hunters all pitching tents for the night. Iris looks mostly the same, her hair a little longer, boasting a hell of a scar on her cheek.

“This is new,” Aranea says, by way of greeting. She runs a gentle finger over the scar. 

“You should see the other six erishkegals,” Iris deadpans. “You like it? I kinda think it makes me look sexy. We Amicitias wear our scars well. That’s what Gladdy always says.”

“You Amicitias should learn to wear a helmet,” is Aranea’s response. “But, yeah. It doesn’t look bad.”

They end up in Aranea’s tent, pitched as close to the edge of the haven runes as they can get. It’s storming, which masks the sounds they’re making – although it’s not like she can’t hear people making similar sounds in a few of the other tents, so who really cares?

“I’m glad you’re okay,” Iris says, afterward, fingers rubbing over Aranea’s breasts. She kind of has a thing for them, but Aranea’s used to that. They  _ are  _ pretty great.

_ I’m glad you’re okay.  _ “Yeah.” Is she? She doesn’t even know, anymore.

Three nights before, Aranea got in a nasty fight with a naga that had appeared out of nowhere, two or three feet from the haven she was heading toward. The fight was brutal; Aranea was alone and she kept looking at the haven runes thinking  _ if I die this close to safety, I’m going to be fucking pissed as hell. _

But it happened that way all the time. She’d seen enough hunters lying dead on the outskirts of a haven to know that daemons, while not the most intelligent of creatures, figured out that humans flocked toward the soft blue lights.

She’d taken her most recent tent from a hunter who’d fallen, hand outstretched, fingers brushing just up against the rock where the runes were. She’d taken his dog tags to give to Dave, like they all tried to do when they came across their fallen brethren. But she hadn’t felt bad about rifling through his stuff and taking what she could use.

Just like someone was going to do when it was her, lying dead from whatever monster finally finished her off.

She’d managed to injure the naga long enough to get to the safety of the haven, but only barely. It hissed and writhed around the edge of the camp for  _ hours _ , and with no daylight to send it on its merry way, Aranea was all but trapped.

She’d ended up screaming at it in pure frustration and rage,  _ why can’t you just die, go away, go  _ away! For the first time she’d looked at the horizon and thought  _ please, just come back. C’mon pretty boy. Get on with it, already. _

The answer to her angry demand of a prayer was a pack of coeurls. Not daemons, but just as deadly. She’d almost cried until she realized that the coeurls were attacking the injured naga, desperate for something to eat.

She’d taken the whiskers off the coeurls, lanced the fucking naga through its dead fucking skull just because, and went on her way.

Thinking about that now, curled up with Iris naked and warm at her side saying  _ I’m glad you’re okay  _ is almost surreal. These moments of pleasure and companionship, are they worth the mind-numbing terror and boredom that makes up every other living, breathing moment of her life?

She thinks maybe they do. She thinks about the dead hunter, reaching toward the haven lights while his life bled out in the dirt. She wonders if anything was worth it, for him.

***

They see each other again in Hammerhead. Iris is there to get her daggers sharpened, and they go in to the diner – less of a diner and more a weapons shop, now – and fall exhausted into a booth, drinking lukewarm terrible coffee and soaking up the light.

A radio is playing in the distance, broadcasting the usual public safety information in fits and starts. Takka comes over and hands them each a bowl of rice with what looks like honest-to-Shiva  _ meat  _ in it.

“I had some extra. No, don’t give me that look. You two go out there every day and put your life on the line.” His face is set. “Eat this. You need more strength than those chips and protein bars.”

“’Member when we had sex in the tent when it was raining?” Iris asks, after taking a bite and chewing, slowly, her eyes closed. “It was really good – especially the second time – but this bowl of rice? It might be better. Sorry, Aranea.”

“Hmph.” Aranea smiles around the fork in her mouth. The expression feels rusty. She doesn’t smile very much, these days. “Sounds like a challenge.”

But, gods. The rice  _ is  _ good. Food is a necessity to keep her body fueled, she can’t remember the last time she ate something she enjoyed.

Hammerhead has an old camper RV and Cindy insists they share it. It’s got a shower and a bed, and apparently, it’s Prompto Argentum’s home when he’s around. But he’s out with Talcott on a supply run to Longwythe, though no one’s sure if there’s anything there worth salvaging.

“I think it gets to him,” Cindy says, unlocking the RV for the two of them. “Waitin’ round here for His Highness to show up.” She shakes her head. “It’s been seven years. Startin’ to wonder if this is all there’ll ever be.”

“Noct will come back,” Iris says, her voice determined. “He  _ will _ .”

“Maybe so,” Cindy says. She looks tired, but her smile is, as always, kind. “Just wonderin’ if there’s gonna be anything left for him to come back to. You girls get some sleep.”

Eventually. First, they take a shower – and there’s actual bodywash, some old generic kind that smells like the best thing on Eos after years of plain, serviceable soap – and the two of them, slick and wet, all hands and eager mouths on each other.

They go to bed, still damp from their shower and do it all over again. It’s good, familiar enough by now that they can tease each other, play with each other for hours, tumbling over into that mind-numbing pleasure that allows them to forget, for a short time, what lies beyond the walls of the RV, the bright lights of Hammerhead.

When they’re done, Iris stretches languidly and says in sleepy, drowsy voice, “I kinda want to stay here just until Prompto gets back. Imagine the look on his face if he walked in and found us naked in his bed.” She giggles softly. “He always did have a crush on you.”

“That kid had a crush on everybody,” Aranea says wryly. She remembers Prompto in Gralea, trying to burn his MT code off his own wrist.

“That’s the truth. I shouldn’t talk. I had a raging crush on Noct.” Iris’s smile fades a bit. They both know that crushes aside, there’s only one person to whom Prompto ever gave his heart. “Gladdy told me about the prophecy. About what it means when Noct comes back.”

Aranea lets the  _ when  _ go by without comment. She’s not sure she believes anything is coming except more rain and more daemons, but there’s no point in saying it. After all these years, Iris is still convinced there’s an end to this that isn’t death.

“I’m betting it’s fucked up,” Aranea says, instead. She’s never been particularly religious, and it’s hard to give the gods credit when the world has gone all to hell. If they cared so much, wouldn’t they have done something already?

“Yeah. Noct will come back, defeat Ardyn, and then light will return. But – but Noct won’t,” she says, her voice thick with sorrow. “He’ll give his life for it. That’s what it will mean when the dawn comes back.”

It’s the first time Aranea has ever seen Iris cry. She doesn’t know what to say, or do – so she does nothing, just sits quietly and watches as Iris angrily dashes at her eyes. “It’s just not fair. That he would come back only to – to die.”

“None of this is fair.” Aranea’s never been very good at comfort, and that hasn’t changed. But Iris takes a slow, deep breath and seems to calm down, so maybe she’s not too bad at it after all. “Let’s try and get some sleep.”

Iris nods, and they lay down together, tangled beneath the covers. But it’s a long time before either of them sleep.

***

Somehow, without really talking about it at all, they spend the next few months together.

Traveling between Lestallum and Hammerhead, assisting convoys and, once, making a harrowing journey to Meldacio to check on the hunters there and bring some much needed supplies of weapons and food.

Aranea knows it can’t last. She’s getting too used to this, having Iris around – both during fights, and at night in her tent. The havens they stay at are deserted, and they both know what that means without having to say it.

There are fewer hunters out and about because there are fewer hunters. They’re both far too experienced to stay together, and they both know it.

By tacit agreement, they decide to part ways when they get back to Lestallum after the trip to Meldacio. They don’t say anything, but that night they’re all over each other in a way that is too desperate, too intense, to be anything other than goodbye.

They stand at the overlook, and Aranea takes a deep breath. “I – look. It’s not that I don’t want you around. You know that.”

“I do.” Iris glances up at her. “But keep talking. I’ll take the memory of your awkward farewell speech with me into the night.”

Iris is –  _ irrepressible  _ in a way that Aranea finds both infectious and irritating. Mostly just infectious. “Be careful. You’re too good in bed to be wasted on a flan.”

Iris throws her head back and laughs – no girlish giggle but a full-out laugh. “Aranea. Wow.  _ Wow.  _ And don’t let your magnificent breasts get crushed by an iron giant.”

Now,  _ Aranea  _ giggles, which she hasn’t done since she was a kid in a world that bears so little resemblance to this one, sometimes it seems like it was a dream. “Good talk.”

“Definitely.” Iris smiles. “Lets try and meet up in a few weeks. Hammerhead?”

“Iris,” Aranea says. “I – maybe we should just play it by ear. Let it happen.” The idea of having plans to meet up with Iris immediately triggers her ingrained sense of doom. If she expects it, looks forward to it, then it won’t happen.

It’s not tempting fate so much as being realistic. At least, that’s what Aranea tells herself.

Iris doesn’t seem to share that opinion, though. “Aranea. It’s okay to care,” she says, very softly. “We need to remember why we’re still fighting. Why we still do this. It’s the only thing that is going to get us through the dark until Noct comes back.”

For the first time, hearing Iris’s unshakable conviction in the inevitability of Noctis’s triumphant return makes Aranea angry. “No, Iris. That’s not what gets us through. That’s not what keeps us fighting, keeps us going.  _ This _ is,” she snaps, brandishing her lance. “This is all we can count on. Everything else is just a distraction.”

Iris smiles, but it looks sad. “You’re wrong,” she says, simply. “This –” she touches her fingers lightly to the burnished silver of Aranea’s lance. “This is what keeps us safe.” She reaches out and touches her fingers to Aranea’s armor, the spot above her heart. “ _ This  _ is what keeps us going.”

It’s a pretty sentiment. Aranea wishes she could believe it. Maybe she  _ does  _ believe it. Maybe that’s why she’s so scared.

***

Several months later, Aranea is out hunting when she comes across a body lying ravaged near a stream.

It’s not an unusual thing, she’s seen plenty of dead bodies even  _ before  _ the Night – Aranea was a soldier, she’d fought in a war. But this one is slight and dark-haired, slender and she sees it and suddenly can’t breathe.

Even an imp could have gotten the drop on her, so rooted was she in shock and horror at the thought of who that might be.  

_ No. No. Please, no. Not her. _

She can’t get the memory of Iris’s sunny smile out of her head, the only true sunlight Aranea has seen in eight long years. She remembers her teasing, the way she liked to stroke Aranea’s back, the taste of her and the sounds she made in bed. Sharing stale chips that night in Lestallum.

Touching Aranea’s heart, saying  _ this is what keeps us going. _

Part of her wants to leave without knowing for sure. She should have guarded better against this. Should have never let herself –

_ You have to look. If it’s Iris, you can’t just leave her here. _

So Aranea looks, fingers shaking as she turns the body over.

It’s not Iris.

Aranea hates herself for the selfish relief she feels when she realizes it. It’s not Iris but it’s a person, though she can’t find any tags to identify who it might have been. That’s the worst part, really. Dead and left to rot, without even a name to share with those left living.

_ It’s not Iris. But it could have been. _

Iris leaves word in Hammerhead to meet her in two weeks at a haven outside Lestallum. She signs the note with a little smiley face.

Aranea can’t forget how it felt, thinking she’d just come across Iris’s body in the middle of nowhere.

She folds the note up and slips it into her pocket. But she doesn’t go to the haven.

***

Over the next year, Iris leaves her notes and Aranea always reads them even if she never writes back, even if she’s never at the havens when Iris tells her where she’s going to be. Iris must know she’s not dead because she keeps trying to reach out – though it could just be her stupid  _ hope  _ that makes her do it, month after month, even though radio silence is all she ever gets.

Aranea runs into Gladio outside of Longwythe. They camp together, and talk about nothing of worth until finally Aranea says, casually, “You seen Iris?”

“Yeah.” Gladio fixes her with a stern look. “She’s pretty pissed at you. What the fuck, Highwind?”

She shrugs. “Falling for someone is stupid. Out here? You know as well as I do that it’ll just get you killed.”

“Fuck, no. Caring about people is the only thing these fucking daemons can’t take away from us,” Gladio says.

Aranea frowns at him, then sighs. Of course. Iris had to get it from somewhere. “You Amicitias, I swear to the fucking Six you are straight out of some kind of tawdry epic romance. All full of battle prowess and trite optimism.”

Gladio snorts. “Better than being full of bitterness and despair, ain’t it?”

That’s the thing. Aranea really doesn’t think it is. “You say tomato, I say tomahto.” At his look, she sighs loudly. “I saw a body. I thought it was hers. It wasn’t, but it fucked me up. Okay?”

“Wow,” Gladio says, grinning at her. He’s grown out his terrible mullet and wears his hair half-pulled back. It’s a good look on him. His resemblance to his sister is there in his smile, which despite his gruff exterior and roughened voice, is just as bright as Iris’s.

Fuck, she has it bad.

“Look. I get it. I do. You think I don’t think the same thing, every goddamn day? And I’m not with Prompto and Iggy, either, because we know we’re better off helping separately than together. But we still check in, Aranea. You could at least do that.”

It turns out that a disapproving big-brother speech…kind of works on her, who knew. “Yeah. Fine. Tell her I said hi.”

“Nope.” Gladio flashes a grin at her, all teeth. “You can. She’ll be near Lestallum in a week. Meet her at the overlook. Don’t make me find you and kick your ass, Highwind.”

“You and whose daemonic army,” Aranea mutters, but she knows when she’s been beaten. “Give me one of those Cup Noodle I know you’re hiding in your bag, and I’ll think about it.”

***

Iris punches her in the stomach, hard, when Aranea walks up to her on the overlook.

She figures she deserves it. But  _ ow. _

“That’s for – what the hell,” Iris hisses, and at least she’s rubbing her knuckles so that’s a bit of a balm to  Aranea’s pride. “You can camp with my  _ brother  _ but not me?”

_ I’m not in love with your brother,  _ Aranea thinks, and it hits her just as hard as Iris’s fist – maybe harder – and leaves her just as nauseous.

But she smiles, too. “I’ll make it up to you, sweetheart,” she wheezes. “Just as soon as I can breathe.”

She does.

***

They travel together some, but they spend a lot of time apart. Aranea does as requested and leaves messages when she can. Caring about someone and not knowing what’s happening to them is a terror more bone-deep than any daemon could hope to inspire.

But there’s something about it that makes it easier to go out, lance in hand and eyes scanning the distance for the tell-tale purple glow of daemons. Something about having a person who matters to come back to. A future that might exist at the end of this.

Aranea’s not sure she believes in Noctis or prophecies or any of it. But she does, she thinks, believe in Iris.

The ten year anniversary of the Night is marked by solemnity in Lestallum. It’s way too fucking depressing, so Aranea drags Iris off to one of the havens nearby and sets up camp.

“All that droning on was getting on my nerves,” Aranea says, by way of explanation.

They both know it’s a lie. All the solemnity and droning on is getting on  _ Iris’s  _ nerves, in the sense that it’s causing her to doubt her certainty that Noctis will return. And Aranea might not believe it, but it’s strange how much it matters to her that Iris  _ does. _

“It’s just weird to think it’s been ten years,” Iris says, later. “And that I’ve…gotten used to it. That is my life, now.” She smiles at Aranea. “And there are parts of it that aren’t just terror and blood.”

“You say the sweetest things,” Aranea drawls, and kisses her. But really, it’s the truth.

***

They’re packing up the camp when she sees it.

It’s not much, at first – just a subtle shift in the eastward horizon. Aranea stares at it, wondering if she’s seeing things. But she can’t seem to move, rooted to the spot and staring.

“Aranea,” Iris breathes. “Is that – is it –”

“Something might be on fire,” Aranea says, but her voice is shaking.

“Yeah,” Iris chokes out. “The sky.”

Aranea drops the gear she’s holding. She can’t drag her eyes away from the horizon. She feels Iris grab her hand and squeeze, and the two of them stand there and watch as the sky lightens.

It’s not a fire, or a mirage, or a trick of the light. It’s the sun.

“Oh, gods,” Iris whispers. “He came back. He did it, it’s…oh,  _ Noct. _ ” Her voice breaks, and Iris starts to sob.

Aranea feels her own eyes burning, from a combination of tears and the unfamiliar brightness of a light long vanished. Iris isn’t the only one who’s trembling. It’s been ten years, and just like that – it’s over. The sun is rising.

She swears she can hear something on the horizon – a noise that sounds like all of Eos is cheering. But maybe she’s just imagining it. Maybe it’s just the roar in her ears, the sight of dawn breaking like it’s nothing momentous, just another new day.

Iris slides her arm around Aranea’s waist. Aranea does the same, and the two of them are clinging to each other, laughing and crying, unable to look away as the sun climbs high into the sky.

“Sure took you long enough, pretty boy,” Aranea mutters, and she doesn’t realize she’s said it out loud until Iris makes a choked laugh next to her.

“But he did it,” Iris whispers, pressing close. She raises her hand and puts it over her heart, and bows reverently toward the dawn. “All hail the King of Light.”

Aranea puts her hand over her heart and bows. “All hail the king.”

***

Aranea doesn’t remember watching the sun set for the last time. 

But she will never forget where she was the first time it rose again. 

  
  



End file.
